Czechs dissatisfied with EU membership

Czechs appear to be quite pessimistic about their EU membership, according to the Policy Association for an Open Society (PASOS), a network of European think-tanks. Czechs are more pessimistic about the EU entry than people in three other new EU members including Bulgaria, Latvia and Poland, with 35 percent of them think that joining the EU has brought their country more losses than benefits, a new PASOS survey found. The poll, released on Tuesday, was conducted in the four nations to gauge the level of citizen engagement in the EU policymaking process. Moreover, the Czechs are dissatisfied with their own politicians' efforts to defend their interests at the EU level, and they are critical of the work of EU institutions, said PASOS Director Jeff Lovitt. Most Czechs do not even realize that they chose the members of the European Parliament in a direct election and they tend to believe that the EU membership has worsened the situation in the field of democracy and their life quality, he added. Compared with the Czechs, the Bulgarians and the Poles view the EU membership more positively, while the Latvians are more pessimistic, but they do not think democracy and life quality have got worse due to it, according to the him.